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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 59458 ***
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
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+
+
+
+                             the earthman
+
+                          BY IRVING COX, JR.
+
+                _The four survivors were sitting ducks
+                  surrounded by barbaric savages. And
+                 they were doubly handicapped, because
+              they knew that one of them was a traitor!_
+
+           [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
+             Worlds of If Science Fiction, December 1955.
+         Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
+         the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
+
+
+The robot supply ship came every Thursday at seven minutes after noon.
+It was an unfortunate hour for the personnel of the Nevada station,
+who happened to be in the commissary at lunch. Out of fourteen hundred
+assigned to the post, only four escaped--two guards on noon duty in the
+watch tower; the Commander's wife, who had skipped lunch and stayed in
+her cottage; and Captain Tchassen.
+
+The Captain was on a hill south of the station making a Tri-D shot
+of the range of mountains west of the camp. He took his amateur
+photography seriously and, like any tourist, he was fascinated by the
+rugged scenery; there was nothing comparable to this on any world in
+the civilized galaxy. To get the back lighting that he wanted, Tchassen
+would cheerfully have given up any number of meals. As a matter of
+fact, he wasn't aware that it was noon until he heard the jet blast of
+the supply ship as it came in on the transit beam.
+
+Tchassen saw the ship spin out of control as the beam went haywire.
+The robot plunged into the heart of the station and the earth shook
+in the catastrophic explosion of the nuclear reactor. The commissary,
+the communication center, the supply sheds and the row of patrol ships
+vanished in the rising, mushroom cloud. Concussion threw Tchassen
+violently to the ground. His camera was smashed against a boulder.
+
+The Captain picked himself up unsteadily. He took a capsule from his
+belt pouch and swallowed it--a specific against shock and radiation
+sickness. In a remarkably short time, Tchassen's mind cleared. He saw
+the prisoners pouring through the gap torn in the compound fence and
+running for the hills. But that did not alarm him particularly. They
+were unarmed and for the moment they represented no real danger.
+
+Tchassen began to run toward the ruined administrative center. He
+had to find out if there were any other survivors and he had to make
+emergency contact with the occupation base on the coast. He ran with
+considerable difficulty. After less than a hundred yards, he was
+gasping for breath. He slowed to a walk. He could feel the hammering of
+his heart; his throat was dry and ice cold.
+
+To the escaped prisoners, watching from beyond the camp, the
+Captain's weakness was unbelievable--for Tchassen, in his twenties,
+had a magnificent build. Typical of the occupation army, he wore
+the regulation military uniform, knee-high boots and tight-fitting,
+silver colored trousers. Above the waist he was naked, except for
+the neck-chain which carried the emblem of his rank. His body was
+deeply tanned. His hair was a bristling, yellow crown. Yet, despite
+his appearance, his sudden exhaustion was very real; Captain Tchassen
+had been on Earth only five days and he was still not adjusted to the
+atmospheric differences.
+
+As he passed the row of officers' cottages, he fell against a wall,
+panting for breath. The flat-roofed buildings were nearly a mile from
+the crater of the explosion, yet even here windows had been broken by
+concussion. A cold, arid wind whipped past the dwellings; somewhere a
+door, torn loose from its frame, was banging back and forth.
+
+Then Tchassen heard a muffled cry. In one of the officer's cottages
+he found Tynia. She had been thrown from her bed and the bed was
+overturned above her. It was a fortunate accident; the mattress had
+protected her from the flying glass.
+
+Tchassen helped her to her feet. She clung to him, trembling. He was
+very conscious of her sensuous beauty, as he had been since he first
+came to the Nevada station. Tynia was the wife of the commanding
+officer: Tchassen kept reminding himself of that, as if it could
+somehow build a barrier against her attractiveness. She was strikingly
+beautiful--and thirty years younger than her husband. It was common
+gossip that she had been flirting with most of the junior officers
+assigned to the station. Tchassen was, in fact, a security investigator
+sent to probe the potential scandal and recommend a means for heading
+it off.
+
+He gave Tynia a shock pill from his pouch. Her hysteria subsided. She
+became suddenly modest about the semi-transparent bedgown she was
+wearing, and she zipped into a tight coverall, made from the same
+silver-hued material as the Captain's trousers. They went outside. She
+stood a foot shorter than Tchassen. Her dark hair framed her face in
+graceful waves; make-up emphasized the size of her eyes and the lush,
+scarlet bow of her lips.
+
+Tynia glanced toward the crater, shielding her face from the noon sun.
+"What happened, Captain?"
+
+"The flight beam failed; the supply ship exploded."
+
+"And killed them all." She said it flatly, without feeling--but
+Tchassen doubted that she would have mourned the loss of her husband in
+any case.
+
+"I'll have to get word through to the coast. We'll need a rescue helio
+and--"
+
+"I know how to use the emergency transmitter," Tynia volunteered.
+"There may be other survivors, Captain Tchassen; they'll need your
+help."
+
+"I don't want to leave you alone, Tynia." It was the first time he
+spoke her given name, though the informality was commonplace among the
+junior officers on the post. "The prisoners are out of the compound. We
+may have trouble."
+
+"Not yet, Captain; they're still unarmed. I'll be all right." She
+nodded toward the crater. "We have to make sure there's no one else
+alive down there."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+He left her reluctantly. She went toward the emergency communications
+room, buried in a metal-walled pillbox which had been intentionally
+located far from the center of the station. Tchassen walked across the
+scarred earth in the direction of the crater. None of the important
+buildings had survived. Concussion had torn up the fence around the
+prison compound, but the cell block, half a mile from the explosion
+and built of concrete and steel, was still standing. The watch tower,
+beyond the prison building, stood askew on bent metal pillars, but it
+was otherwise undamaged.
+
+The Captain knew that at least two guards were on watch duty at all
+hours; they might still be alive. He crossed the crater and pulled
+himself up the battered stairs to the top of the tower. The door was
+jammed. Using a broken piece of railing as a lever, he pried it open.
+He found the two guards unconscious, slumped across their observation
+console.
+
+He gave them shock capsules, but the men regained consciousness slowly.
+While he waited, Tchassen read their identity disks. The Corporal,
+Gorin Drein, was a three-year draftee, serving a six month tour of
+duty on Earth. He was a fair-haired, blue-eyed boy, probably no more
+than twenty years old. Sergeant Briggan was an army career man, in
+his fifties and only a few years away from retirement. Yet the only
+physical indication of his age was the touch of gray in his bristling
+mane of dark hair.
+
+When their erratic breathing steadied and they opened their eyes, the
+Captain explained what had happened. Both men were still groggy; the
+shock pills inhibited their normal emotional reactions. Neither Briggan
+nor Drein had much to say until Tchassen helped them down from the
+tower and they stood looking at the hole blasted in the earth.
+
+"The supply rocket," Sergeant Briggan said slowly, "couldn't have done
+this; the beam landings are foolproof. The prisoners must have pulled
+it off, though I don't see--"
+
+"How?" Tchassen broke in. "The compound fence didn't go down until
+after the blast; there was no way any of them could get out."
+
+"Robot ships just don't get off the beam," Corporal Drein declared
+stubbornly.
+
+Briggan nodded toward the empty cell block. "It worked out nicely--for
+the prisoners. A single explosion wipes out most of us; but the
+prisoners are far enough away from the blast center to escape."
+
+"Surely there isn't any danger of revolution," Tchassen asked,
+unconsciously mocking the optimism of the security bulletins. "Not any
+longer."
+
+Briggan grinned. "You've only been here five days, sir; you don't know
+how thoroughly our indoctrination has failed. The Earth people hate us
+more than ever."
+
+"Even so, how could one of the prisoners have brought the robot down?"
+
+"By tampering with the beam."
+
+"But that means they had a subversive--that means one of us must be--"
+
+"An Earthman, yes. We encourage them to apply for citizenship. If we
+had an Earthman on the post masquerading as an officer, how would we
+know it--unless he told us? They're no different from our own people,
+Captain."
+
+On the other side of the crater Tynia staggered out of the
+communications pillbox. Tchassen saw her waving frantically and he knew
+something was wrong--very wrong. He began to run toward her. Briggan
+and Drein followed close behind him. Almost immediately the Captain
+staggered and gasped for breath; he motioned for the Sergeant and the
+Corporal to go on without him.
+
+Briggan waited long enough to say, "So far we've located four
+survivors, sir--only four. And one of the four is very probably an
+Earthman. The transit beams don't fail of their own accord. It's not a
+very nice thing to think about, is it, sir?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The two men left him and Tchassen walked slowly, alone across the
+barren land. The wind whispered against his naked chest; it felt
+suddenly cold and forbidding. The ragged peaks piled on the western
+horizon were no longer simply photogenic curiosities of an alien world,
+but symbols of undefined terror.
+
+Why had the supply robot crashed? Why had the prisoners been able to
+get away without a casualty? Had it been planned by an officer of
+the station? If so, where was he now--with the prisoners, dead in
+the commissary, or among the four survivors? The tide of questions
+hammered at Tchassen's mind, but he came up with no workable answers.
+His real trouble stemmed from the fact that he knew so little about
+the Earth people. Their reasoning was beyond rational analysis. They
+were physically identical to normal human beings, and it was almost
+impossible not to assume that their thinking would be normally human,
+too.
+
+When Tchassen reached the communications pillbox, the Sergeant, the
+Corporal, and Tynia were inside. In the gloomy half-light he saw
+the others silently trying to patch together the broken wires of
+the transmitter. It was hopeless; Tchassen saw that at once. Only a
+master technician could have made sense out of that jumbled maze. The
+other three knew that, too. They stopped when they saw Tchassen and
+looked at him expectantly, waiting for him to tell them what to do.
+With something of a shock, he realized that he now ranked as station
+commander.
+
+"I don't believe the explosion wrecked the transmitter," Tchassen
+decided uncertainly.
+
+"It was torn up like this when I first came in," Tynia told him.
+
+"So we couldn't get in touch with the occupation base. Obviously one
+of the prisoners did it. They must have had--" The Captain licked his
+lips. "They must have had outside help."
+
+"What do we do now?" Tynia's voice was shrill with rising hysteria. "We
+can't radio for a rescue ship. How do we get away?"
+
+"It's up to us to find something else."
+
+She moved close to Sergeant Briggan, reaching for his hand. "The Earth
+people are outside somewhere, waiting to kill us. We can't escape,
+Captain! And you start talking nonsense--"
+
+Very deliberately Tchassen slapped the back of his hand against her
+cheek. The pillbox was abruptly very still. She stared at him, her eyes
+wide. Slowly she raised her hand and touched the reddening mark on her
+face. She shrank against Briggan and the Sergeant put his arm around
+her shoulders.
+
+"You didn't have to do that, Captain," he bristled.
+
+"Don't quarrel," Tynia whispered. "Not on my account."
+
+Tchassen's muscles tensed. This was the way Tynia had created
+tension on the post; he had seen it happen to her husband. Yet
+could he honestly blame her? It wasn't her fault; just the irony of
+circumstance. And Tchassen knew that his anger now was primarily envy,
+because she had turned to the Sergeant for protection and not to him.
+
+He made himself relax. "Hysteria," he said, "is a luxury none of us can
+afford."
+
+"You're right," Tynia answered. "Absolutely right. I was very foolish."
+
+She moved away and Briggan muttered, "Sorry, sir. I didn't think--"
+
+"We must get back to the coast," Tchassen said briskly, "through
+territory occupied by the enemy. We can scrape together all the
+weapons we'll need and the roads are supposed to be passable. Our only
+problem, then, is transportation."
+
+"Maybe we'd better stay here," Tynia suggested.
+
+"Sitting ducks for the Earthmen to attack?"
+
+"You said we have weapons."
+
+"Not enough to hold out indefinitely."
+
+"Sir," Corporal Drein intervened, "there's an old, enemy vehicle in the
+prison building. We used it sometimes for field inspections."
+
+"Let's look it over."
+
+Captain Tchassen had seen the instructional films which were made
+immediately after the occupation. He could identify the sedan--an
+inefficient, petroleum-burning machine, typical of a primitive people
+who had just reached the threshhold of the Power Age. The original
+beauty of design had long since disappeared. Only one window and the
+windshield were unbroken; the body paint was peeling away in spreading
+patches of rust; the pneumatic tires were in shreds and the vehicle
+moved noisily on bent, metal rims.
+
+They fueled the car with gasoline confiscated long ago and stored in
+drums in the prison warehouse; Corporal Drein volunteered to do the
+driving. In the officers' cottages they found weapons--a portable heat
+beam, half a dozen dispersal rays, and a box of recharge cartridges.
+In terms of Tchassen's technology such weapons were minor sidearms,
+but they were superior to anything yet produced by the Earth people.
+Tchassen was sure he had the power to beat off any attack.
+
+The survivors were handicapped in only one respect: all the food on the
+post had been destroyed with the commissary. However, Tchassen did not
+consider that a serious problem. He was sure they could reach the coast
+by the following morning.
+
+Shortly before three o'clock--nearly two hours after the supply robot
+crashed--the survivors left the station. They headed west on a highway
+unused since the conquest. Tchassen and Tynia sat together in back. The
+Captain kept all the weapons. Briggan's warning couldn't be ignored;
+one of the other three might be an Earthman. Unless they faced an
+actual emergency, Tchassen did not intend to let any of the others
+carry arms.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The sedan lumbered over cracked and crumbling asphalt. The tireless
+rims made a nerve-wracking din that prevented all conversation.
+Tchassen was unused to any sort of surface transportation. The
+civilized galaxy had outgrown it centuries ago; the flight beam, safe
+and inexpensive, was universally used. With equal ease the beam could
+move a one-man runabout or a cargo freighter over any distance--a
+few feet or the light years gapping between planets. Twice Tchassen
+revised his estimate of the sedan's speed. At this rate, it would be
+twenty-four hours or more before they reached the coast. That made
+their shortage of food far more significant.
+
+Through the shattered side window Tchassen scanned the arid soil. It
+was remotely possible that they might stumble across a native food
+cache, but he couldn't count on that. He wasn't even sure the caches
+existed, although the theory was a basic factor in the occupation
+policy.
+
+The galactic council of scientists estimated that one-tenth of the
+Earth people had never been rounded up and resettled in the prison
+compounds; bandit raids increased that number steadily. How the rebels
+survived no one knew, for any large scale food production would
+have been spotted by the patrols and wiped out. One or two crackpot
+theorists said the bandits fed themselves by hunting wild game, but
+that was absurd. It was common fact throughout the civilized galaxy
+that any culture which evolved as far as the Power Age would, in the
+normal process of growth, eliminate all planetary animal life. The
+accepted explanation was the food cache theory. According to it, the
+Earthmen--sometime after the conquest and before the prison compounds
+were set up--had raided their own cities and hidden the packaged food
+in remote mountain areas. The supply was decidedly limited. When it was
+gone, the rebels faced starvation unless they returned voluntarily to
+the compounds.
+
+The Sierra range between the Nevada station and the coast had become a
+haven for so many escaped Earthmen that the region was marked "enemy
+territory" on the occupation maps. Although Tchassen was aware of that,
+he knew he could not assume that, because the four survivors had to
+pass through a rebel area, they would discover a cache of food. Far too
+many organized expeditions, sent out expressly for that purpose, had
+returned empty handed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+As the afternoon shadows lengthened and the sedan seemed to be moving
+no closer to the snow-capped peaks, the air became colder. Tchassen's
+naked chest was studded with gooseflesh. Drein and Briggan were rubbing
+their arms to keep warm. Tchassen was accustomed to the controlled
+temperatures on the civilized worlds and the comforts of the beam
+ships. It hadn't occurred to him that the regular military uniform
+might be inadequate.
+
+He felt the subtle pulsing of fear, the crushing loneliness of a
+stranger on an alien world. He fingered the barrel of a dispersal
+ray, but the weapon gave him no sense of security. He had a terrible
+sensation of psychological nakedness. The weapons could drive off
+bandits, but what protection did Tchassen have against the unknown
+elements of a savage world? We've failed; we have no right to be here:
+the words lashed at his mind like an insinuating poison. He could feel
+sweat on his face and chest, sweat turning cold in the icy wind.
+
+Now the sedan entered a decaying village nestled close to the
+mountains. It was in an amazingly good state of repair--undoubtedly
+because it was located so far from the coastal cities that it had
+escaped destruction during the invasion. Then, too, the village was too
+close to the Nevada compound for the Earth people to have looted it.
+Tchassen tapped on Drein's shoulder and ordered him to stop the sedan.
+
+"We need warmer clothing," the Captain explained, "before we start up
+the grade."
+
+"I suppose we might pick up something here," Sergeant Briggan conceded.
+"This place is called Reno. It was one of the few communities still
+intact after the invasion."
+
+"I'm scared," Tynia said. "The prisoners may be hiding here, waiting
+for us."
+
+"They have better sense than to face a dispersal ray without any
+protection." Tchassen's tone was crisp with an assurance he didn't
+feel, but it satisfied her. Drein opened the door and stood on the
+sidewalk, waiting for Tchassen to hand out one of the weapons. But
+Tchassen couldn't be sure Drein was not an Earthman; nor, on the other
+hand, could he ask the Corporal to explore an enemy town unarmed. As a
+sort of compromise, Tchassen said,
+
+"We'll stick together; I'll carry all the weapons, Corporal."
+
+It wasn't satisfactory, but both Drein and Briggan were too
+well-disciplined to protest. Tchassen felt foolish with six dispersal
+rays and a heat beam slung over his shoulders, but he couldn't risk
+leaving anything in the sedan, either.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The survivors spent a good part of an hour searching the downtown
+stores, but Reno had been stripped of native artifacts; the buildings
+were empty shells filled with dust. The only chance they had of finding
+clothing was to look in the private homes closer to the outskirts. They
+went back to the sedan and drove to a residential street. By that time
+the sun was setting. Tchassen did not relish the prospect of being
+caught in an enemy town after dark, but the search could be speeded up
+only if they separated.
+
+For a second time the Captain compromised. He issued dispersal rays
+to the others, but insisted that they work in pairs. If one of them
+was an enemy, that arrangement would more or less tie his hands.
+Tynia volunteered to go with Drein; Tchassen felt a pang of envy and
+jealousy, but he had better sense than to use his authority to force
+her to come with him.
+
+Tchassen and the Sergeant searched through half a dozen houses before
+they found one that had not been looted. Their luck was unbelievable,
+for they found shelves of canned food as well as clothing sealed in
+plastic bags. From an open window the Captain fired a dispersal ray
+toward the sky, a signal prearranged with the others. As the needle
+of light arched above the village, Tchassen heard a distant blast of
+explosions and Tynia's shrill scream of terror.
+
+"It's a bandit raid!" Briggan cried. He turned to run toward the
+street. Tchassen's hand shot out and caught the Sergeant's shoulder.
+
+"Not so fast. I said we'd stay in pairs."
+
+"But Tynia's in trouble! The Earth people are barbarians, sir. They
+give no quarter. They--"
+
+"I'm still in command, Sergeant."
+
+Briggan stiffened. "Yes, sir."
+
+The two men walked toward the source of the sound. Tchassen couldn't
+allow himself to run, even to help Tynia; the exertion would have been
+too much for him. There was another clatter of shots and Tchassen
+recognized the gunfire of the primitive Earth weapons. In the darkness
+it was vaguely disturbing, but not frightening. Both Tynia and Drein
+were armed with dispersal rays; they would have no trouble defending
+themselves.
+
+Sudden footsteps pelted toward them. Tynia ran from a dark side street
+and threw herself into the Captain's arms. She clung to him, trembling
+and panting for breath.
+
+"Where's Drein?" he demanded.
+
+"The Corporal--he took my gun. He tried to kill me!"
+
+"Tynia, do you understand what you're saying? The accusation--"
+
+"You told us to stay together. I did my best. I was going through a
+house when I realized suddenly that I was alone. I saw Drein outside; I
+thought he was talking to someone. I ran out and--" She bit her lip and
+hid her eyes against his shoulder.
+
+In a flat, emotionless voice, Tchassen asked, "Drein was with Earthmen?"
+
+"I don't know! Someone sprang at me and knocked the ray out of my
+hands. I saw people--I thought I saw people--in the shadows behind
+Corporal Drein. I began to run. I don't want to accuse him of--of
+anything, Captain. I can't be sure. If he's an Earthman, we have
+to--we have to dispose of him, and I wouldn't want--"
+
+Her voice trailed off in a gasp of terror as they heard a new burst
+of gunfire, very close. Tchassen dodged aside, pulling Tynia behind a
+tree. Sergeant Briggan fired blindly into the night. His dispersal beam
+danced across the face of a frame building and the house exploded into
+flame. In the red glare of the fire, Tchassen saw a band of savages,
+dressed in animal hides--no that was impossible!--fleeing into the
+darkness beyond the village.
+
+Corporal Drein staggered toward them. Blood spilled from a gash torn in
+his chest. He saw Tchassen, Tynia and the Sergeant standing together.
+Like a man in a daze, he began to raise his dispersal ray.
+
+In Tchassen's mind there was no longer any room for doubt; the truth
+was clear. Drein was an Earthman; Drein had betrayed the station; Drein
+now intended to kill off the only survivors. The Captain acted with
+military decision. He pressed the firing stud of his weapon. Drein
+screamed in agony as he died.
+
+Tynia buried her face in her hands. Briggan put his arm around her. In
+the flickering light, Tchassen saw the Sergeant grin.
+
+"You didn't have to kill him, Captain," Tynia whispered.
+
+"After what you told me--"
+
+"Don't blame me; I didn't do anything!"
+
+"He was going to fire at us, wasn't he?"
+
+"You don't know that for sure. Maybe he was asking for help!"
+
+Tchassen shrugged; there was no accounting for the emotional
+inconsistencies of a woman.
+
+"What did you expect to prove by murdering Drein?" Briggan asked.
+
+"I saved us from--"
+
+"If he was an Earthman, why were the bandits firing at him? Why had
+they wounded him?"
+
+"To make it look good," Tchassen replied, no longer really believing
+it himself. "They wanted our weapons; they have to use trickery to get
+them away from us."
+
+Tchassen slid the weapon out of Drein's lifeless fingers and
+half-heartedly searched the street for Tynia's dispersal ray. He didn't
+expect to find it. The Earth people had it now. The loss of the weapon
+was, in one sense, more serious than the destruction of the Nevada
+station. A prison compound could be rebuilt and restaffed. But if the
+Earth ever faced the conqueror with equal firepower, Earthmen would
+recapture their world--and more.
+
+We've failed; we have no right to be here--the Captain fought a burning
+nausea as the fear washed over his mind. What had they accomplished by
+the occupation? The Earth was neither enslaved nor destroyed. Hatred
+made the natives savages. They would never be content until they had
+revenge. They never conceded defeat; they never would. Corporal Drein
+seemed to be typical of their fanaticism, and that was why Tchassen had
+killed him--that, and the hysterical story Tynia had told. On calmer
+reflection, Tchassen knew he had no proof of Drein's disloyalty--which
+meant that either Briggan or Tynia could be Earth natives. That
+problem was unsolved; the danger was undiminished.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Tchassen wasted very little time looking for the weapon Tynia had lost.
+After twenty minutes, the three survivors returned to the house where
+Tchassen and Briggan had found food and clothing. They packed the
+canned goods into the sedan and put on warm coats and jackets. Although
+the woolens and the cottons fell to pieces when they touched the cloth,
+the synthetic fabrics were still relatively sound, particularly when
+they had been sealed in mothproof plastic.
+
+Tchassen took over the driving when they left Reno. For greater warmth,
+Tynia and the Sergeant crowded into the front seat beside him. As
+they ascended the grade toward the pass, the air turned much colder.
+Tchassen's hands felt numb on the wheel and the altitude made his mind
+swim in a haze of vague nausea.
+
+There was no moon and the headlights of the sedan had been smashed long
+ago. The Captain drove very slowly, concentrating on the curves of the
+highway. Three times the machine narrowly missed going over the edge;
+the guard rail saved them. Tchassen knew he was risking their lives to
+drive at night, but he had no alternative. They would not be really
+safe again until they reached the base on the coast, and the Earth
+people would try to prevent that. They would try to make sure that no
+survivors lived to report what had happened at the Nevada station.
+
+Briggan fished three cans of food out of the back of the car and
+blasted them open with his dispersal ray. The can he handed Tchassen
+contained a fruit in a heavy, sickly sweet syrup. Tchassen made himself
+empty the tin. Tynia had a pinkish meat which she was totally unable to
+choke down. The civilized galaxy had been vegetarian for two thousand
+years; a clear indication of the savagery of the Earth culture was the
+fact that the natives still ate animal flesh. Briggan opened another
+can for Tynia. After a brief hesitation, he began to eat the meat
+himself.
+
+Tynia gagged and looked away. "I don't see how you can do it, Sergeant."
+
+"We may be on the road longer than we think," he answered. "We can't
+afford to waste anything; we aren't likely to find another food cache."
+
+Tchassen glanced at Briggan suspiciously. It was possible that he could
+force himself to stomach the meat, if he were starving, but how was
+he able to eat it now? An Earthman could do it; yet if Briggan were
+a native, wasn't he too clever to give himself away with anything so
+trivial?
+
+"Tell me, Captain," Briggan asked, "what chance do we have of getting
+through this alive?"
+
+"We're armed; we have transportation; we--"
+
+"And the natives will risk everything to stop us. They have to. This
+attack on the Nevada station was the beginning of the revolution. If
+they plan the rest of it as carefully, they stand a good chance of
+throwing us off the Earth."
+
+"No!" Tynia cried. "Now that they know the civilized galaxy exists,
+they'll build space ships and come after us. With our weapons--"
+
+"Plus their fanaticism," Tchassen put in, "the galaxy doesn't stand a
+chance."
+
+"But we invaded the Earth to prevent that; we came here to teach them
+to live civilized lives."
+
+"How much teaching have we actually done in the compounds?" the
+Sergeant demanded. "How many Earth people have listened to us?"
+
+"They're human beings; they have brains like ours. Surely when we have
+explained our ways to them logically and sanely--"
+
+"The trouble is," Tchassen said thoughtfully, "it's our logic, not
+theirs. If you look at this from the point of view of an Earthman, you
+see us as savage invaders of their world."
+
+"Our purpose makes it different."
+
+"We say that, but the Earth people wouldn't understand us."
+
+"It's very strange," Sergeant Briggan said quietly, "that you
+understand the Earthman's point of view so well, Captain Tchassen.
+Let's see. You've been here--how many days?"
+
+"Five."
+
+"But you set yourself up as an authority on these people."
+
+"Come now, Sergeant. I didn't say that. I'm simply trying to understand
+them reasonably."
+
+"To think like an Earthman: that's rather difficult for us to do,
+Captain." Briggan paused briefly before he snapped out a rapid
+question, "Where were you stationed before you came here, Captain?"
+
+"At security headquarters."
+
+"Assigned to what staff?"
+
+"Well, I was--" Tchassen glanced at Tynia. It would do no good, now,
+to explain why he had been assigned to the Nevada post. All that was
+finished because the station staff died in the explosion. "I wasn't on
+any staff," he said. "I was working on my own."
+
+"That's a pity, sir. You wouldn't remember the name of your commanding
+officer, then; I could have checked up on that."
+
+Tynia gasped; only then did Tchassen realize what Briggan's questions
+implied. He said coldly, "You're way off the track, Briggan. I'm
+the only one of you who couldn't be an Earthman; I haven't become
+acclimated yet--that's obvious, isn't it?"
+
+"Of course you're right, sir. It wouldn't be the sort of thing you
+could put over by playing a part, would it? Besides, Drein was the
+Earthman and you killed him. We've no reason to be suspicious of each
+other now, have we?"
+
+There was no way Tchassen could reply. He gritted his teeth and
+said nothing. From the expression on Tynia's face, he realized that
+Briggan's insinuation had been rather effective. And suppose Briggan
+actually believed it himself. Didn't that rule out the Sergeant as an
+Earthman?
+
+And it left only Tynia. Tchassen eyed the dark-haired woman on the
+seat beside him. What did he really know about her?--only that she
+had been married to a station commander; and had flirted outrageously
+with other post officers. She may have done it simply because she was
+bored; on the other hand, it could have been a deliberate attempt to
+create friction--exactly the sort of thing an Earth woman might try
+to do. Perhaps she was a native. When Tchassen was given the security
+assignment, he hadn't checked into her background; it didn't seem
+necessary. He realized suddenly that Tynia was the only witness against
+Drein. Because of what she had said, Tchassen had killed the Corporal.
+Tynia's hysteria had set the stage for murder.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+As the sedan climbed higher into the pass, it moved more slowly. The
+motor coughed and wheezed; once or twice it seemed ready to stop
+altogether. When they reached the summit, the tenuous crescent of a new
+moon emerged above the pines. In the pale glow of light, Tchassen saw
+that the highway was covered with a treacherous sheet of ice.
+
+The metal rims found no traction. When the machine began to skid, the
+Captain found he could neither control it nor stop it. In spite of the
+cold, his body was covered with sweat.
+
+At a point four or five miles beyond the summit, they came to a place
+where thick trees on both sides of the highway shaded the road so the
+sun never reached it. The ice was continuous for a hundred feet or
+more, and it was covered with three inches of unmelted snow. The sedan
+skidded out of control. Tynia screamed and hid her face in her hands.
+Tchassen fought the wheel futilely. The car spun toward the shoulder,
+banged against a tree, and slid across the road into a clearing in
+front of an abandoned building.
+
+In the sudden silence Tchassen heard nothing but the whisper of icy
+wind in the trees. He opened the door and looked at the deserted
+building. The roofs of the smaller structures nearby had collapsed
+under the pressure of winter snows, but the main building, sheltered by
+tall pines, was in good repair.
+
+"We'd be warmer inside," Tchassen suggested. "In the morning after the
+sun comes out--"
+
+"Captain!" Briggan broke in. "We must reach the coast!"
+
+"--after the sun comes out, the ice on the road should begin to melt;
+the driving will be much easier."
+
+"Don't you realize, sir--these mountains are enemy territory?"
+
+"We're still well-armed, Sergeant."
+
+"We had the rays in Reno, too, but Drein's dead."
+
+"I tell you we'll be safe here. I remember a trick I saw demonstrated
+at the school of tactics."
+
+"You security men have the advantage. I'm just an enlisted non-com. I
+never went to the military schools and learned any fancy tricks, but I
+know I have a duty to reach the coast and report what's happened."
+
+Tynia took Briggan's arm. "The sedan won't run, Sergeant. Surely you
+aren't saying we have to walk--"
+
+"It's interesting, isn't it, that the car stopped right here--in front
+of a place where it would be so convenient for us to spend the night?"
+
+"What do you mean, Briggan?"
+
+"I wasn't doing the driving, Tynia."
+
+A hard knot of anger exploded in Tchassen's mind, but he held his
+temper. It was easier to ignore Briggan than to answer his suspicion.
+In a tone that concealed his feelings, the Captain said, "Let me show
+you what I saw them do in the demonstration, Sergeant." He slid out of
+the sedan. With numb fingers, he opened the firing box of the portable
+heat ray and took out one of the two thermal coils. Breaking the seal,
+he began to unwind the thin thread of wire.
+
+"We have our own alarm system right here," he explained, trying to
+convey more enthusiasm than he really felt. "Nearly a quarter mile of
+wire. We'll string it in a circle around this clearing, six inches
+above the ground. The natives will never notice it. If they attack
+us, they'll snap the wire and set off the thermal reaction. We'll be
+surrounded for a second or two in a blazing ring of fire."
+
+"Maybe it'll work, Captain."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The two men strung the wire while Tynia lugged the weapons and the
+canned goods into the abandoned building. When the Sergeant and
+Tchassen went inside, they found that she had started a fire in a
+pot-bellied stove. The Captain stood holding his hands over the flames
+and gradually he began to feel warm again. He knew that the pillar of
+smoke rising from the chimney might invite an attack by the natives,
+but there was also a good chance that the smoke would disperse before
+it could be spotted.
+
+The warmth of the fire acted like an opiate, but Tchassen realized
+he didn't dare risk falling asleep. Tynia or Briggan might be Earth
+people, waiting for the chance to finish the job they had begun when
+the Nevada station was destroyed. After a brief hesitation, the Captain
+took another shock capsule from his belt pouch and choked it down.
+The drug would keep him awake, although it was dangerous to take a
+second capsule so soon after the first; there were sometimes emotional
+side-affects which were unpleasant.
+
+"One of us should stay on guard," Briggan said. "We could take turns at
+it, Captain--two hour stints until dawn."
+
+"Good idea, Briggan. I'll stand the first watch."
+
+"I was going to volunteer--"
+
+"No; you're tired; you and Tynia need your sleep."
+
+"You're too considerate of us, Captain." The overtone in Briggan's
+voice suggested far more than he actually said. He lay back on his
+blankets, but he did not shut his eyes, and he put his dispersal ray
+across his belly with his hand on the firing stud. Tchassen stood up,
+sliding a weapon over each shoulder.
+
+He went through a connecting hall into a narrow room. A few scattered
+dishes, overlooked by the looters, and built-in cooking machines
+indicated that this had been a restaurant. The room gave him an
+excellent vantage point, for the windows, still unbroken, provided a
+broad view of the highway and the clearing in front of the building.
+
+The restaurant was bitterly cold. Tchassen pulled the rough, fibrous
+clothing tight around his shoulders, but it felt irritating rather than
+warm. He looked out on the ice and the snow and the pines, and he was
+acutely conscious of the savage alienness of Earth.
+
+Snow he knew as a scientific curiosity; he had seen it created in
+laboratory experiments. Nowhere in the civilized galaxy did it exist
+as a natural phenomenon. The teeming billions of people crowding
+every world could not survive unless every square inch of soil was
+occupied and exploited. Science regimented the temperatures in the
+same way that it controlled rainfall. For more than twenty centuries
+neither deserts nor Arctic wastes had existed. All animal species had
+disappeared. Trees survived only as ornamental growths in city parks.
+The Earth was a relic of the past, a barbaric museum piece. The strong,
+individualistic genius of its people had evolved in no other society;
+and that genius had created a technology which mushroomed far beyond
+the capacity to control it. It gave this savage world atomic power
+before it had planetary unity.
+
+For that reason, the civilized galaxy had invaded the Earth. They
+could do nothing else. The decision had been made long before Tchassen
+was born. The galactic council of scientists studied the Earth and
+argued the meaning of their observations for a quarter of a century
+before they ordered the invasion. War, to the civilized galaxy, was
+unthinkable; yet the government had no alternative. For, with even
+their primitive form of atomic power, the Earth people could blow their
+world to dust. The planet had to be occupied to save the natives from
+the consequences of their own folly.
+
+But what does it matter, Tchassen thought bitterly, if our intentions
+were noble and unselfish? It's what Earth thinks we meant to do that
+counts. And by that standard we've failed. We have no right to be here.
+
+Alone in the cold darkness of the abandoned restaurant, Tchassen
+faced the fear gnawing at his soul. The drug he had taken warped his
+depression into a crushing weight of melancholy. The occupation of
+the Earth had gone wrong--or so it seemed to him--because the council
+of scientists misjudged the native mentality. True, these people had
+created a brilliant technology, but it didn't follow that they would
+comprehend the social forces at work in the civilized galaxy. Their
+emotional reactions were at best on an adolescent level; intelligence
+alone would not lift them up to maturity. The prisoners in the
+compounds learned nothing but hatred; they lived for nothing but
+revenge. Vividly Tchassen saw the nightmare of the future: the time
+when the savages on the Earth had weapons to match the dispersal ray;
+the time when they would be able to build ships that could invade the
+civilized galaxy.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The Captain paced the dusty floor in front of the serving counter.
+Briggan did not come in two hours to take over the watch; and he made
+no attempt to call the Sergeant. It was long after midnight, perhaps
+less than an hour before dawn, when something outside triggered the
+thermal-wire alarm. Simultaneously, as the blaze of white glared
+against the restaurant windows, Tynia screamed. Tchassen heard the
+explosive blast of a dispersal ray slashing into wood. A split-second
+later Tynia burst through the connecting hall and flung herself into
+Tchassen's arms.
+
+"They're attacking!" she screamed.
+
+"You saw them? Where?"
+
+"Briggan. At the window. I--I shot him."
+
+His fingers bit into the soft flesh of her arm. "Take it easy, Tynia.
+Tell me how it happened."
+
+"I saw him when the alarm went off. He was lifting his dispersal ray,
+as if he meant to shoot you. I remembered how he had eaten meat last
+night, and I--I thought--" She shuddered. "I knew he was an Earthman.
+He was the one who blew up the supply robot; now he wants to kill us."
+
+"You were sure Drein was an Earthman, too."
+
+"What do you mean by that?"
+
+"It's obvious, isn't it?"
+
+"Obvious?" She shrank back against the counter.
+
+He ignored her but kept her within the range of his peripheral vision
+while he glanced through the window, trying to locate what had set off
+the alarm. The circle of heat had melted all the snow and ice in the
+clearing; the trunks of the pines were smoldering and a corner of the
+building was beginning to burn.
+
+Tchassen saw a chunk of flesh lying on the road--an animal of some
+sort which had blundered into the alarm wire. Then they had not been
+attacked by natives. The dead animal made it very clear that wild
+beasts still survived on the Earth. No wonder the natives were meat
+eaters! And, since they were, that meant they could live indefinitely
+in the remote mountain areas. They did not depend upon hidden caches of
+food; starvation would never drive them back to the prison compounds.
+The occupation policy was based upon a false assumption; more than ever
+it was vitally imperative for Tchassen to reach the coast and report
+the truth to his superiors.
+
+Tchassen shifted his weapon so that his fingers lay on the firing stud.
+Tynia stared at him, her eyes wide with terror. In a tight whisper, she
+said,
+
+"Then you--you're the Earthman, Captain!"
+
+He grinned, admiring her skillful use of emotion. If he hadn't known
+better, he would have taken her fear for the real thing. Maybe it was;
+he couldn't be sure, but the facts seemed to add up to only one answer.
+Tynia laid the groundwork for the killing of Corporal Drein; she
+herself shot Briggan. And who had been in a better position to tamper
+with the landing beam for the supply rocket? Who else had a better
+opportunity to destroy the transmitter in the emergency pillbox? Yet,
+even in the face of so much evidence, Tchassen gave her the benefit of
+the doubt! His reasoning might have been colored by the drug he had
+taken.
+
+With the mouth of his weapon, he nudged her toward the hall. "Go back
+and pick up the food, Tynia. We're leaving here now."
+
+She clenched her fist over her mouth. "Don't turn me over to them,
+Captain. Let me go. I've never done you Earth people any harm."
+
+Magnificent acting! No wonder they had sent her to the Nevada station.
+"We're heading for the coast," he explained.
+
+"The sedan wouldn't go last night; it won't now, either."
+
+"We'll push the car back to the highway. The downgrade is steep enough
+to make the machine run without power. If that doesn't work, we can
+always walk."
+
+"It'll be warmer if we wait until daylight."
+
+"And the natives would be here by that time, too, wouldn't they? The
+glare of the thermal explosion was visible for miles."
+
+"I didn't sleep at all last night, Captain. I don't have the energy
+to--"
+
+With the dispersal ray, he pushed her along the hall toward the room
+where she and Briggan had slept in front of the pot-bellied stove.
+Naturally she would try to keep him there, he thought; he didn't need
+much more proof of her disloyalty.
+
+Flames from the burning wall lit the room. As they entered, Tynia
+screamed and fell back against Tchassen.
+
+"The Sergeant's gone!" she gasped.
+
+"Along with the weapons you left in here."
+
+"Then he--he's the Earthman, Captain; you aren't!"
+
+"You said you'd shot him."
+
+"I fired at him. I saw him fall. I thought he was dead."
+
+Tchassen wanted to believe her, but the husky, deep-throated appeal in
+her voice couldn't quite destroy the hard core of his doubt. This could
+be an alibi which she could have contrived for herself. She might have
+hidden the weapons as well as Briggan's body. If Tchassen believed her,
+if he let himself trust her, it would be easier later on for her to
+dispose of him.
+
+"Pack up the food, Tynia; I'm going to see if I can start the car."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When he went outside, the dawn was brightening the eastern sky. The
+snow and ice, melted by the thermal fire, made a slushy sheet of water
+in the clearing; it ate at the drifts, sluggishly washing the snow into
+the highway.
+
+Tchassen waded through the water toward the sedan. His boots kept him
+dry, but the cold penetrated and made his feet numb. Hidden by the
+water were tiny, unmelted puddles of ice which made very treacherous
+footing. Twice the Captain slipped and nearly went down.
+
+He was twenty feet from the car when he heard the door of the building
+bang open behind him. He glanced back, calling Tynia a warning to be
+careful of the hidden ice. At the same time she screamed. Tchassen
+swung aside instinctively. He slipped and fell. From the back of the
+sedan a thread of energy snaked toward him. Tchassen felt the momentary
+pain stab at his shoulder; then nothing. He lay flat in the icy water,
+fighting the red haze that hung over his mind. If the dispersal ray had
+come half an inch closer to his heart, it would have cut the artery and
+killed him.
+
+Sergeant Briggan opened the door of the sedan and stood leaning against
+it, holding a dispersal ray in his left hand. The Sergeant was badly
+wounded. His right arm was an unrecognizable, bleeding pulp; he was too
+weak to stand alone. So Tynia had told the truth, Tchassen thought; she
+actually had shot him. The Captain felt a surge of relief and hope.
+Perhaps he could rely on Tynia, after all. But now it was too late!
+The blast from the Sergeant's weapon had paralyzed Tchassen's motor
+control; he was helpless.
+
+The Sergeant, obviously, assumed that Tchassen was dead. Ignoring him,
+he ordered Tynia to pile the canned food in the back of the sedan. She
+moved toward him slowly.
+
+"You're the Earthman," she said dully. "And I thought Captain
+Tchassen--"
+
+"The farce is over, Tynia. You and Tchassen made a fine game of it
+for a while, but I've been in the service long enough to spot a fake
+security officer."
+
+"The Captain and I?" she repeated.
+
+"Do I have to draw you a blueprint? You two are in this together.
+You're both natives."
+
+For a moment she seemed to recover her self-assurance. "So that's how
+you're going to play it, Sergeant. Just who do you think you'll take in
+with such nonsense?"
+
+"I'm through batting words around with you, Tynia. Put the food in the
+car. Help me push the machine out to the road."
+
+"Why bother, Sergeant? If you stay right here, the natives will be
+along soon enough."
+
+"I'm glad you admit that, Tynia." Briggan laughed sourly. "But it's my
+duty to get through to the base--just as it's your duty, I suppose, to
+try to stop me."
+
+"Why do you still want to make me believe that, Sergeant? What
+difference does it make now?"
+
+Tchassen, paralyzed and unable to speak, suddenly realized the truth.
+Each of them feared the other. All four survivors had assumed that one
+of the others had to be an Earthman. We put our faith in machines, he
+thought; we were too certain that the robot ship couldn't crash simply
+because something had gone wrong with the beam. Our real trouble is
+we have no faith in ourselves. None of us was an Earthman; the Earth
+people had nothing to do with the destruction of the Nevada station.
+
+He wanted desperately to shout that out. After a supreme effort, he was
+able to make his lips move a fraction of an inch; and that was all.
+
+Tynia put the canned food in the sedan. Briggan waved her to the back
+of the car with his weapon. He held the beam leveled at her while she
+pushed the sedan toward the road. The clearing was built on a slight
+slant and she had no trouble moving the heavy vehicle. As the wheels
+began to turn, Tynia pretended to slip and fall into the slushy water.
+
+Briggan was distracted by the motion of the sedan. Tynia rolled toward
+Tchassen and snatched up his dispersal ray. The Sergeant realized what
+she intended to do and lifted his weapon awkwardly in his left hand.
+
+No! Stop! Don't be fools! The words sang through Tchassen's mind, but
+he could not speak. Briggan and Tynia fired simultaneously. The beam
+caught the Sergeant squarely in the face. He died in a blaze of energy.
+The sedan rolled into the road and Tynia fell unconscious beside
+Tchassen.
+
+He wanted to help her, but he was still not able to move. In another
+half hour the paralysis would be gone, but by that time it would be too
+late to do anything for Tynia. Furiously he drove his body to respond
+and he managed to turn on his side.
+
+The exertion was too much for him. The haze swam in painful waves
+across his mind. Just before unconsciousness came, he saw a band of
+natives on the edge of the clearing.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The swaying motion of the stretcher shook him awake. The Earthmen were
+carrying him along a narrow mountain trail, past deep drifts of snow.
+His wound, where Briggan's beam had hit him, was neatly bandaged; he
+could smell the odor of a disinfectant. It surprised him that the Earth
+people knew so much about medicine; but it surprised him more that they
+had tried to save his life.
+
+He listened to his captors when they talked. He was able to understand
+a few phrases of the native dialect which every man assigned to
+the occupation had to learn, but what he had been taught was sadly
+inadequate. When one of his stretcher bearers saw that the Captain was
+conscious, he spoke to him in the cultured language of the civilized
+galaxy. The syntax was awkwardly handled, yet Tchassen was amazed that
+the Earthman used it so well.
+
+"Be no fear," the native said. "You get living again."
+
+"Tynia. The girl with me--"
+
+"Wound bad; she dead before we come. We follow from prison and try help
+all four you. You fight each other. You have evil weapons. We can save
+only you."
+
+"What are you going to do with me?"
+
+"Make you well; send you back."
+
+The answer came as a shock to Tchassen; it was what a civilized people
+would have said. But the Earth natives were savages--brilliant,
+inventive individualists, but nonetheless social barbarians. It would
+have seemed much more logical if the native had said he was keeping
+Tchassen for a religious ceremonial sacrifice.
+
+"As soon as my wounds are healed," Tchassen repeated, "you'll let me
+go?"
+
+The native ran his hand over the Captain's bandages. "This wound is a
+little thing, of no importance." He touched Tchassen's head. "Here is
+your real sickness, in the brain. We teach you how to think like a man;
+then you go home."
+
+"You're going to teach me? Me? Do you realize, I come from the
+civilized galaxy?" Tchassen began to laugh; he wondered if he had been
+taken prisoner by a band of madmen.
+
+"We show you how to be human," the native answered blandly. "Not fight
+and kill each other, the way you and the others did when the post blow
+up. We know meaning for civilization; you have none. It is easy secret.
+We learn after the invasion, when our world destroyed. Real civilized
+people get along; live in peace; give help to each other. Your people
+and ours: we can be brothers here on the Earth, and on your other
+worlds, too."
+
+Tchassen's laughter was touched with hysteria. Have we failed? He knew
+the answer now: for the captives, the dispossessed men of the Earth,
+would become the teachers of the conquerors--and teach them what the
+conquerors had come to build on the Earth. No, we have not failed; we
+have simply misunderstood the strange genius of the quixotic Earth. The
+defeated would one day rise up and conquer the galaxy. Tchassen saw
+that clearly, but no longer in fear. He wanted to make their stamina,
+their grit, their ability to survive a part of himself. He wanted to
+make himself over--as an Earthman.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Earthman, by Irving Cox
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 59458 ***